


Spaces Between

by Crowgirl



Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-14
Updated: 2011-10-14
Packaged: 2017-10-24 14:26:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/264520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crowgirl/pseuds/Crowgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>So this was actually the first piece of slash I ever wrote. Cue 'awwwws' all 'round, please. :) It was originally meant to be part of a larger series of stories that myself and two other friends were going to write; as it turned out, this was the only one that ever really saw the light of day! I've got a couple shorter pieces that follow this one; they might go up at some point in the future.</p><p>Brief (fangirl) Japanese glossary:<br/>baka: idiot<br/>yamatte: stop<br/>gomen/gomen nasai: sorry<br/>kisama: bastard</p></blockquote>





	Spaces Between

‘Do any of you know where Maxwell is?’

WuFei glanced up from the movie he was watching, shook his head. ‘I have not seen him since dinner. Is something wrong?’

Heero snorted in frustration, planting his hands on his hips. ‘He was supposed to meet me for a Japanese lesson half an hour ago!’

Quatre looked up from the puzzle he and Trowa were working on at a corner table in the large open room. ‘Maybe he forgot.’ He slotted the piece in his hand into place. ‘You know what Duo’s like.’

Heero snorted again. ‘I reminded him just before we ate.’ He glared around the room as if the truant might be discovered under a chair, behind a futon, or clinging to the ceiling.

‘He said he had some adjustments to make to Deathscythe,’ Trowa said quietly, sorting through the puzzle pieces before him, selecting one and sliding it into place. ‘Perhaps he is down in the repair bay.’

‘ _Baka!_ ’ Heero spun on his heel and stormed out of the room.

* * *

 _Why couldn’t I just’ve died? Would that have been so hard? Just end in one great big blazing bang at the end of the last battle and end this whole damn thing as a war hero....Goddamn it!_ Duo slammed his hand against Deathscythe’s control panel, earning himself an outraged squawk from the system.

He threw himself back against the chair, driving the belt buckles hard into the muscles of his back. He didn’t move to a more comfortable position; instead, he sat forward and threw himself back again even harder. _God, if these things only had fucking sharp edges!_ Something to cut through skin, muscle, bone...just leave him bleeding on the outside like he bled all the time on the inside.

 _What am I supposed to do now...what the fucking hell am I supposed to do now? Thanks, doc, for leaving me so well pre-goddamned-pared for life after the fucking war! Could’ve left me some kind of primer on life in peace time. “Thirty Things to Do When You Never Had a Life Before the Age of 16.”_ Duo swiped his wrist over his face, wiping tears, sweat, blood from his skin. _But, no, that would’ve been easy. Saved my life and fucked it up beyond recall all in one grand gesture. Thanks a lot, doc. Maybe I can catch you up and repay you a bit of that._

His hair was escaping from its neat braid, straggling around his face and neck, but he couldn’t be bothered to fix it now. He swept it back out of his eyes with an impatient gesture and continued typing. Panels lit and flashed around him. As the tears in his eyes made it hard to see, he would shake them away or wipe his eyes roughly, but he kept his hands moving over the keys.

* * *

Heero marched down through the levels of the house, frustration and anger building with every step he took. Duo had asked for these lessons -- specifically! Several times! And every other time he had at least shown up.

He had gone to the trouble of preparing lesson plans, vocabulary lists, memorization aides, grammar exercises -- and Duo couldn’t even be bothered to show up! _Just because he’s handsome he thinks he can get away with anything! Just because he’s comical and goodlooking and--baka, baka!_

As Heero stormed closer and closer to the door of the repair bay, it occurred to him to wonder why Duo would have gone down to the repair bay. At night. After dinner. To do repairs on a machine that he was no longer using.

 _No. He has no excuse._

* * *

 _All right. All right, that’s it._ Duo sat back in the chair, dragging in a deep, raspy breath, ignoring the pain along his back where the buckles had smashed into his muscles.

He pushed a final button and the displays lit up around him, the blue and green light from the panels giving his skin a corpselike tint. He took another breath, found he still felt like gasping, tried again. His head was spinning and, when he glanced up to steady himself by looking at the far wall, he found he couldn’t see it. There was nothing but grey mist in front of his eyes when he tried to see something more than a few inches away. He felt himself collapsing again and dug his nails into his palms. _No! I won’t do this! This is the only way -- there’s nothing for me here. There’s no-one for me here. None of the others would understand and they’re the only ones who might. They’re all happy - Trowa, Quatre, Heero...Heero’d never understand. He’d just think I’m crazy and walk away from me. WuFei’d just tell me life isn’t fair and I have to figure out a way to deal with it but he wouldn’t friggin’ tell me the way!_

Duo groaned deep in his throat and squeezed his eyes shut. Thinking about the other pilots, about Heero and WuFei, wasn’t making this any easier.

 _No._ He opened his eyes again, grinding his palms against his cheeks to get the moisture off them. _No. They don’t give a damn about me. If I ever said anything to Heero he’d just give me that ‘I’m the perfect soldier; I don’t understand anything as stupid as emotions’-look and walk off. No. I’m a useless god of death and who the hell needs that hanging around?_

* * *

Heero pushed open the door into the repair bay and stood at the top of the long stairwell, looking down into the cavernous room. At the far end, a massive sliding door let in a few cracks of moonlight and a tiny breeze from the outside world.

* * *

Duo reached down and pulled the self-destruct switch from its place under the main console. He cupped it in his hands delicately, as if it might break. It was a simple cylinder with a button at one end; it was attached by a long wire to the bomb in the heart of Deathscythe.

He ran his thumb over the button, feeling the smoothness of the plastic, the cool of the metal in his palm. _And here’s the solution. All of it’ll be over._ The thought brought nothing but relief -- something akin to the relief of stepping out of a steam room into a cool shower.

He glanced around the bay one last time. Wing and Shenlong were safely stored in a bay on the other side of the property. Heavyarms and Sandrock were on the far side of this bay. They might be damaged by the collapse of the room, but he doubted it. The girders overhead were strong and he had done some prepatory surveying. Whatever fell on the other two Gundams would barely be enough to damage the outer casing. Trowa and Quatre would be able to dig them out without any trouble -- especially with the Maguanacs, Heero and WuFei there to help. _Probably all happily cursing me for being a thoughtless twit..._

But then they wouldn’t need to worry about him any more. He could see the worry in Quatre’s eyes every time the young blond man looked at him. No, Quatre wouldn’t need to worry about him, Trowa could stop teaching him acrobatic tricks to pass the time, WuFei could stop pretending to be interested in manga and Heero...could go back to being Heero.

Duo took a deep breath, still caressing the switch in his palm, stroking it gently as if it were a small animal he were trying to soothe.

* * *

The air in the bay smelled of oil, dirt, metal and the various lubricants used on the Gundams. Heavyarms and Sandrock were only looming shapes in shadow, identifiable only because he knew where they were. Deathscythe, on the other hand, was in a bright pool of light and he could see Duo sitting in the cockpit, fiddling with something at the console.

 _Damn baka -- fooling around with the Gundams when he promised to meet me!_ Heero started down the stairs, building up a good solid head of fume for when he got down within Duo’s hearing range. He already had a whole set of insults lined up in his head, starting with "lazy," going on to "good for nothing," then to "wasting my time," "making me worry about you" was probably not going to be said but "foolish—"

He stopped some yards away from Deathscythe. Duo was sitting very still, staring down at whatever was in his hand.

‘Maxwell?’ Heero walked forward to the Gundam’s feet, shouting upwards. ‘Maxwell!’

* * *

 _...just gotta press this button...that’s all. then i won’t have to worry about this any more -- won’t be any more problems, just nice peace and quiet. i won’t have to get up tomorrow morning and think about what to do, won’t have to go to bed tomorrow night thinking about the nightmares that are going to wake me up in two hours, won’t have to go through all the days after that thinking about...about all the people who don’t care about me, won’t have to go looking for work....hah! that’s a laugh. me looking for a real job. unless the specs include killing hundreds of people at one go, i’m not really qualified. nineteen years old and unqualified for anything. so all i gotta do is press this button...just--_

* * *

‘Maxwell! Goddamn it, answer me!’ Heero stared upwards, anger starting to fade into unwilling concern. The other man still wasn’t moving, had replied at all, hadn’t even seemed to acknowledge Heero’s presence. He was still just staring down at his hand and Heero had a cold, sick feeling in the pit of his stomach that he knew what Duo was looking at.

‘Duo! Answer me! What the hell do you think you’re doing?’

* * *

 _Go away._

* * *

‘Go away.’

‘I will not go away!’ Heero began to scramble nimbly upwards along the cracks and crevices of Deathscythe’s leg. ‘You are half an hour late for your lesson.’ He swung himself over the open chest plate, crouching on the console in front of Duo. ‘Do you know how long I spent making that lesson plan?’ As he spoke, his eyes darted around the pilot compartment, trying to assess what was going on.

Duo was sitting in the pilot’s seat, clutching the self-destruct switch, staring at it as if it were a snake about to bite him. His face was streaked with sweat and blood was trickling from the corner of his mouth. His white shirt was sweat-stained, unbuttoned to his breastbone and smeared with oil and dirt.

‘You’re late, Duo.’ Heero balanced his weight on the balls of his feet, eyes focussing on Duo’s glazed ones.

Duo shook his head slowly, a few more strands of hair working free of his braid and sticking to the sweat on his forehead. ‘Not yet...’

Heero craned his neck down a little, trying to see how tightly Duo was gripping the switch. It looked as if he had a death grip on it, but his fingers weren’t near the actual button. If Heero moved quickly enough--

‘Go ‘way, Heero...’ Duo swallowed hard and looked up at him, shaking his head a little, although Heero doubted if Duo knew he was doing it. ‘Go ‘way...you’re not gonna want to be here in a second or two...’

‘Why?’

Duo’s eyes re-focussed on the switch in his hands. ‘Gonna press this. Gonna be all over. Gonna be all done.’

‘Why?’ Heero bounced slightly on his feet, trying to test how quickly he could move on an uneven surface.

‘Don’t wanna be here any more...don’t wanna...don’t...’

‘Why don’t you want to be here, Duo? Don’t you like it here?’

‘Don’t talk to me like that!’ Duo screamed, eyes shining with anger, glaring directly into Heero’s. ‘Don’t talk to me like that! I’m not a child! I never was a goddamn child!’

‘All right, I’ll talk to you like you’re the goddamn _kisama_ who left me standing for half an hour after dinner tonight!’ Heero shouted back at him.

‘What?’ Duo blinked at him, confused, tears glazing the darkness of his eyes.

‘Your lesson, Maxwell, the lessons that you’ve been begging me for for weeks. Remember?’

‘Oh...oh, right...’ Duo nodded, wiping tears off his cheeks with one filthy hand. He made a noise that could only be described as something in between a true laugh and a hysterical giggle. ‘Doesn’t matter...didn’t work anyway...’

‘You were doing quite well, actually.’

‘...never noticed me anyway...Heero never notices me...nobody notices me...lessons, no lessons...doesn’t matter...’ Duo waved one hand in an airy gesture, still giggling.

Heero stared at him, temporarily wordless. _Notice him? I..._

Duo shook his head, stopped laughing, blinked and focussed his eyes on Heero. ‘Yuy, I can’t...I’m sorry I was late but I can’t....there’s nothing for me to do here...I can’t pretend to be interested in how many ways I can twist my legs around the back of my head and....’ He was speaking faster and faster, hands waving around in grandly dramatic gestures. ‘...and still get up every morning and pretend that everything’s just fine now that the war’s over, everything’s just great and I feel fine and wonderful and perfect and not lonely or guilty or fucking screwed-over or--’

Heero reached forward and neatly slid the self-destruct switch out of Duo’s palm, then yanked the cord so hard that it popped free of its housing. Duo stared at him for a minute, then started to laugh again, hugging himself, rocking back and forth in his seat.

‘Oh, God...oh, great...thanks, Yuy, thanks a whole _fucking_ bunch.’ He leaned forward, yelling directly into Heero’s face. ‘Do you know how fucking _long_ I’ve been sitting here trying to get that damn thing to work! I’m not like you -- I didn’t test the damn thing by _using_ it every two seconds! It’s going to take me fucking _hours_ to repair that!’

He slammed both hands palm-down on the console, a few inches from Heero’s toes, almost levitating out of his seat with anger, face flushed, eyes shining. ‘There is nothing here for me, Yuy! I want to be out of this goddamn place and if death is the only place left then, by God, I’ll go there! I don’t want to be here! This world is not mine -- there’s nothing for me to do! What am I supposed to do -- get a job as a greeter at the goddamn World Peace Instititute or whatever the hell it is Relena’s setting up? Or sell myself as a circus sideshow to Trowa’s old buddies? Come and see the reformed Gundam pilot?’

‘No.’ Heero tossed the switch and cord down onto the concrete floor, listening with a certain satisfaction to the clunk it made when it hit. ‘No, you’re supposed to relax and enjoy peace like the rest of us.’

‘Enjoy?’ Duo stared at him as if Heero had just sprouted horns. ‘Enjoy this...this fucking stagnation? Are you fucking joking? There’s nothing to do! Just day after day of nothing!’

‘Then we’ll find something for you to do.’

‘We — we!’ Duo slammed his hand down again. ‘There is no _we!_ We’re all alone here — don’t you get it? There isn’t anything here for us! What the fuck am I talking about--’ He flung his hand into the air and it came back down with another thump that echoed in the bay. ‘There is no _us_. The only _us_ is Quatre and Trowa. The rest of us are just a bunch of guys who are too fucking pathetic to go out and find lives of our own so we hang around sucking off each other. There’s just me -- there’s just you -- there’s just WuFei.’ Duo smacked himself on the chest. ‘There’s just us alone, Yuy. We’re all a-fucking-lone. No matter what I do...no matter....’ He collapsed back into his seat, the furious energy that had been animating him leaching out of his body. ‘There’s just Shinigami all alone. All alone....just me...’ He pressed his hands over his face, shoulders shaking.

Heero bit his lip hard, glancing at the stairs. Quatre would really be the better man to deal with this, but Quatre wasn’t here and Heero didn’t dare leave Duo alone long enough to go find him. Admittedly, a hysterical, sobbing, rocking Duo was new on his list of experiences, but he was fairly certain it wasn’t one he wanted to see again -- and he sure as hell wasn’t going to trust Duo alone anywhere anytime soon.

He reached forward cautiously, pressing his hand over the pad of muscle at the top of Duo’s shoulder, the closest he could get to the fullbody hug Quatre would have given him. Duo shrugged him away sharply, not even looking up, but Heero tried again -- and again -- and again until finally Duo apparently got sick of shrugging. Heero let his hand rest in place, feeling Duo’s shoulders rock and heave with the silent sobs he would not let be heard.

‘We finally have a chance to stop being Gundam pilots, Duo. That’s what you said you always wanted.’

Duo glared up through his fingers. ‘And you fucking _believed_ me? This is all I know how to do, Yuy! This is it! You may be the perfect adaptable soldier man or whatever the fuck you are but I’m not!’

‘What about the salvage yard on L2?’ Heero said, keeping his voice as quiet and reasonable as he could. Duo was being unreasonable enough for the both of them and Heero was by no means sure that he didn’t have a second self-destruct rigged somewhere in the cockpit. The last thing he wanted to do was push enough of Duo’s buttons that the other man got desperate and, for example, lunged forward. He was more than strong enough to carry Heero with him backwards out of the cockpit and the fall to the concrete floor would undoubtedly kill them both.

‘What about it?’ Duo slumped back in his seat, fingers of one hand playing with a seat buckle. ‘Hilde’s running it. Better than I can. She needs me like she needs a half-ton of shit on her doorstep.’

‘You are marginally more useful than a half-ton of shit, Maxwell.’ If Heero hoped for a laugh, he failed.

Duo glared up at him, tears thick on his cheeks. ‘Thanks, Yuy. Thanks. Should’ve known I could count on you.’

Anger Heero could deal with. Anger he was familiar with. He sat back on his heels, letting his hand slide of Duo’s shoulder. ‘What do you want me to say? You thought only of yourself in arranging all this.’

‘No.’ Duo crossed his arms sulkily for a second, almost pouting, then went back to playing with the seat buckle. ‘I’m not an idiot, Yuy, whatever you think I am. I calculated the blast radius. Sandrock and Heavyarms would have been fine. You could’ve dug them out in less than a day. The rest of the house wouldn’t’ve been touched. You’re not the only one who can do math, Yuy.’ Duo stuck his tongue out at Heero, but Heero wasn’t watching his face; he was studying Duo’s hands instead, watching him play with the belt buckle.

After a few seconds he realised what Duo was doing: sliding one long finger at a time into the mouth of the buckle then pushing the buckle backwards with the other fingers, bending the trapped joint almost to the point of breaking.

‘Stop that!’ Without thinking, acting on pure reflex, Heero grabbed Duo’s wrist and pulled the buckle out of his grip, throwing it down along the side of the seat. He looked down at Duo’s hand and groaned. ‘Oh, Christ, Duo, look at your hands...’ There were purple marks all along Duo’s fingers where the buckle had cut into the skin.

‘What about it?’ Duo yanked his hand free, fishing another buckle from the seat. He pushed the index finger of his free hand into the mouth of the buckle, glaring at Heero as if daring him to do something about it. With his other hand, Duo pressed in the sides of the buckle, making the internal mechanism clamp down around his trapped finger.

‘Fine.’ Heero sat back on his heels pretending an indifference he did not feel, part of him fuming, part of him wanting to scream at Duo for daring to hurt himself. ‘Go ahead. Do whatever you want.’

Duo’s eyes were slowly filling with tears again, whether from emotion or pain Heero could not tell. ‘See?’ He released the buckle, let his index finger slide free, now swollen and red with a painfully white line where the metal had bitten deeply into the skin without quite breaking it. ‘See?’ He thrust his ring finger into the buckle and began the same slow torture process. ‘See? I said no-one would care what happened to me.’

Heero snarled something neither he nor Duo understood and lunged forward, wrenching Duo’s hand free, flinging the seat straps away from him so they thunked dully against the side of the cockpit and bounced back behind the seat. He pinned Duo’s legs down by sitting on them, slamming Duo’s hands up above his head. ‘Don’t you _ever_ fucking say that!’

Duo stared at him, face pale, eyes wide, a small shocked sound escaping him like a mouse’s last squeak. ‘What?’

‘Don’t you ever _ever_ fucking say that nobody cares what happens to you!’ Heero pushed the other man’s wrists back hard against the seat, wishing that he had Duo out in the open so he could pick him up and shake him.

‘Why not?’ Duo sniffed, swallowed, the movement a convulsive jerk in his throat as he tilted his head back to look at Heero.

 _Do not look at his throat. Do not look at his throat. Do not think about his throat._ Heero swallowed and summoned his willpower. ‘Quatre cares. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you were giving him a migraine as we speak.’

Duo managed something that was almost a hoarse laugh. ‘Quatre gets a migraine if one of the Maguanacs has a hangnail. Quatre gets a migraine if it’s a Tuesday. Quatre gets a migraine if he wants Trowa to take him to bed and Trowa isn’t getting the hint fast enough.’

Their eyes met for the first time as the last words left Duo’s lips and Heero felt himself flush. For the first time, he realised how precarious his situation was, balanced on Duo’s lap, holding his hands above his head, their faces a few inches apart. Even flushed, tearstained, furious and close to suicidal, Duo was still Duo. _Damn._ Heero had to swallow twice before he could trust his voice to work. ‘Trowa would miss you.’

A look akin to disappointment flashed across Duo’s face and he laughed again, sourly, wriggling his shoulders against the seat and looking away. ‘Trowa would miss someone to teach. Yuy, you’re not listening to me - there isn’t a damn soul out there who would miss _me_ \--’ Duo yanked one hand free of Heero’s grip and patted himself on the chest. ‘ _Me_. Myself. Me. Would miss me for anything I can give them that they can’t get from anyone else.’

Heero stared at him for a long minute, biting his lips hard, trying to think of something to say that wouldn’t seem either exploitative or uncomprehending. "I would" seemed too easy -- Duo would never believe him. "What about me?" was really only a cry for pity. "I need you" just seemed like a fragile lie to cover "I want you" and, true as they both might be, Heero would not say that. "You give me something I can’t get from anyone else" was just begging for the response "Well, what?" And what could he say in response to that? A sparring partner for verbal infighting? someone to teach Japanese to? a full rich fantasy life dreaming of long chestnut hair on pale cream skin?

He couldn’t think of anything else that wouldn’t be an outright lie and a falsehood, easy to deliver now, would only hurt that much more later when Duo discovered the lie.

Duo looked back, lips shaking a tiny bit, his hand now lax in his lap, waiting as if whatever Heero said next would decide some great overhanging fate that loomed over them both.

Heero looked down at him and knew, suddenly and without doubt, that if he stayed in that position for one second longer, he was going to kiss Duo. And that would not be right.

‘Come.’ He altered position swiftly, keeping his grip on Duo’s wrists, and slinging the smaller man over his shoulders. Duo squawked in protest and beat on his back.

‘What the hell are you doing, Yuy! Put me the fuck down!’ Duo’s braid swung in his face, loose hair getting in his mouth. He spat out the strands and whaled on Heero’s hips with all the force he could muster in his odd position.

Heero put his foot in the sling and let it carry him and his protesting burden to the floor. ‘You are not behaving in a rational manner and I refuse to leave you in a situation where you may do damage to yourself or others by your unconsidered actions.’

‘Speak English!’

‘I am speaking English. You missed your Japanese lesson.’ Heero proceeded up the stairs and into the house, ignoring Duo’s shouts and protests.

* * *

Heero’s room was at the far end of the top floor and, by the time he got there, he was intensely grateful that Duo had stopped thrashing around. For one thing, Duo was heavier than he appeared and hauling him up four flights of stairs was no picnic. For another, parts of Heero’s mind which he usually ignored were starting to engage and present him with lovely little rose-colored fantasies of what parts of Duo currently pressing into him might look like.

Ignoring the wayward parts of his cursedly visual imagination, he kicked his door open, went in, kicked it shut behind him, and dumped Duo unceremoniously on the bed. Duo bounced upright again instantly, eyes shining with anger. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing, Yuy! Carting me up here like a goddamn backpack!’

‘I was removing you from a situation in which you were tempted to do something incredibly foolish,’ Heero replied evenly, searching through the drawers of his desk for a medipack he knew he had stored away someplace. He finally found it tucked behind a stack of computer disks.

‘I was not!’ Duo was sitting on the edge of the bed, hands clenched in the coverlet, stray hairs standing out like a halo around his face.

‘You were. You were about to destroy your machine and yourself in an entirely out of proportion explosion.’ Heero opened the medipack and pulled out the tube he wanted. ‘If you truly desire to end your life, I can think of several dozen less damaging ways to do it.’

Duo stared at him, mouth hanging slightly open in surprise. Then he closed his jaw with a snap, settling back into his hips with the look of a man about to proffer a dare. ‘Name one.’

‘Poison.’ Heero knelt down in front of Duo and picked up one of his hands, mourning inwardly at the fat purple rings that were swelling the skin and distending Duo’s slender fingers. ‘Gun to the head.’ He began to rub salve gently into Duo’s hands, ignoring the other man’s wincing. ‘Drowning. Razor to the wrists or the throat, if you have the self-control for it. Hanging.’ One hand done, he turned to the other. ‘Starvation. Self-immolation. The nearest cliff. Hara-kiri. Seppuku, if you feel less certain of yourself.’ Finished, Heero sat back on his heels, recapping the tube. ‘But don’t even think of asking me to help you.’

Duo was staring at him, disbelief written all over his face. ‘Do you spend time thinking this shit up?’

Heero met his eyes squarely. ‘Yes.’

Duo went back to the wordless stare. After a few moments, the hair hanging in his face finally seemed to attract his attention and he brushed it away. The movement caught at the soreness in his back and he was unable to hide the wince.

Heero was on it immediately. ‘Turn around.’

‘Yuy, it’s nothing--’

‘Turn around, Maxwell. Don’t make me do it for you.’

Duo took in the steely look in Heero’s eyes and decided that giving in was the better part of valor -- or possibly the better part of not getting thrown on his face on the bed and having his back examined no matter what he wanted. He yanked his shirt the rest of the way out of his pants and turned around, half-kneeling on the bed to let Heero see his back.

Heero stared at the blossoming bruises along Duo’s back and pressed his hand over Duo’s spine, feeling the bruised skin hot and tense against his palm, but, before he could do anything else, Duo jerked away, pulling his shirt down. ‘Don’t even try it.’

Heero’s fingers tingled and he could feel a guilty, angry flush burning on his cheeks. The guilt was tempered by insult -- did Duo really think he was going to make some kind of pass at him?

‘Look...’ Duo looked a little abashed now. ‘Look, it’s nice of you to try, Yuy, but...thanks for fixing my hands and everything but I...I...’ He stumbled over the last word, seemed to get it stuck in his throat and stared down at his bruised hands for a long minute, then tears started coursing down his cheeks again. ‘I can’t...’

Heero watched helplessly as Duo dissolved back into tears, collapsing in on himself, burying his face in his hands again. His own hands twitched to touch Duo’s shoulders, pull the sobbing man in to his chest, tell him, show him that there was someone who cared about him, who wanted to help him fix whatever pain was tearing him in half. But... _Quatre. I should go get Quatre._ He rose from the bed. ‘Maxwell, I will be back in--’

‘No!’ Duo’s fingers, abused as they were, were still strong enough to clinch around Heero’s wrist and pull him back onto the bed. ‘No, please!’ The look he gave Heero was sheer desperation and Heero gave way before it, sinking back onto the bed beside him.

‘I was going to fetch Quatre. He--’

‘No!’ The fingers tightened.

‘All right, all right.’ Roughly, a little clumsily, Heero patted Duo’s hand. ‘I will...stay.’

Duo sniffed hard, wiping at his eyes, although this made no appreciable difference as far as Heero could see. ‘Quatre....’ He shrugged, trying to rationalise the voice of pure panic that had made him cry out and keep Heero beside him in a way the other man could understand. ‘Quatre’s nice but ...I...don’t...He and Trowa are probably off in bed by now...I don’t want to wake them up..’

‘They are both still awake down in the common room.’

Duo still shook his head. ‘I...no.’ He summoned a tiny half-smile. ‘It’s...it’s bad enough you found me...’ The tears started down his cheeks again and his lips were shaking as he went on. ‘Christ, Heero, couldn’t you’ve just left me? What harm would it have done?’

‘What harm...’ Heero stared at him for a long moment before realising that Duo had no idea of the unconscious black humour of what he had just said. ‘No. I could not have just left you.’

‘Why not...’ Duo pulled his knees up to his chest, wrapping his long arms around them and intertwining his bruised fingers. His next words came out muffled, through his knees. ‘I did the math right -- the other Gundams would have been fine. No-one else was going to be down there. Who could it have hurt?’

Heero found himself staring again, unable to think of anything intelligent to say. _Who could it have hurt? Who--_ He swallowed his own thoughts. ‘Don’t you think we would have missed you?’

‘No.’ Sulkily. ‘You only came lookin’ ‘cause I missed your lesson.’

‘ _Baka._ I mean afterwards.’

Duo looked up at him, eyebrows knit tight together. ‘Why should you?’

‘ _Baka! Kisama!_ ’ Heero’s grasp of language went up in flames as his anger stormed back to the forefront of his emotions, bringing with it the knowledge that Duo could have no possible idea how much they would miss him because none of them had ever told him. Duo would have had no idea how much Heero would miss him because Heero had never told him and Heero had nearly lost his chance without even knowing it. Then that thought, too, went up in flames, and Heero began to curse him efficiently and thoroughly in Japanese. When he exhausted his stock of profanity in that language, he switched to English. ‘You thoughtless, slackwitted, drooling, woolbrained, stupid, inconsiderate idiot son of a onelegged prostitute!’

Duo had raised his head as the waves of profanity rolled over him and was staring at Heero wide-eyed. When the other man wore down, there was silence in the room for a few minutes before Duo asked, in a small, quiet voice, ‘Onelegged?’

‘What?’ Heero dragged in a deep breath.

‘Onelegged prostitute. What’s so bad about being onelegged?’

Heero stared back, seeing nothing but fright, incomprehension and dullness in Duo’s dark eyes. ‘Christ, Duo...’ He felt his shoulders sag inwards. ‘We’ve been through so much. How could I not miss you?’

Duo shrugged, planting his chin on the back of his hands. ‘You’ve got the other guys.’

‘So have you.’

‘Not the same.’ Duo shook his head, tendrils of hair tickling at his temples. ‘Not the same. You’re one of them. You’re learning to live in peace.’

Heero barked a laugh before he could stop himself. ‘When I spend my spare time devising ways to kill myself?’

Duo glanced up, eyes startled again. ‘What?’

‘Did you think I came up with that list solely for your benefit? Or that I simply improvised off the top of my head?’ Heero shook his head, staring down at his hands between his knees. ‘No. I thought up that list a long time ago.’

‘So....’ Duo half-shrugged. ‘Why didn’t you use any of them?’

‘I thought about it for a long time.’ _And then I thought about a man with a long braid and eyes that turn purple in the right light._ ‘And I decided that I had tried to die more than once and all my attempts had failed. Perhaps...perhaps being alive was better than being dead. If the afterlife didn’t want me, then perhaps there was something for me here.’ He glanced sideways at Duo, but Duo was no longer looking at him.

Duo nodded, staring into space. ‘Well, I thought about it, too. And I made the opposite decision so who the hell are you to tell me I can’t do it?’ He was on his feet and grabbing for something out of the medipack before Heero could react. _Almost_ before Heero could react.

Heero threw himself forward, grabbed Duo’s outstretched hands and hurled him bodily onto the bed, ignoring Duo’s stifled cry of pain as his sore back hit the firm mattress. Discounting any thought of personal space, Heero planted himself firmly astride Duo’s hips, crossing his arms and looking down at the other man like a teacher reprimanding an errant student. ‘There is nothing in there that could harm you.’

‘What about this!’ Duo opened his hand triumphantly, then stared at the object in his palm in dismay. It was a short stitching needle threaded with a length of surgical silk.

Heero laughed at the downfallen expression on his face and picked the needle off his palm, throwing it onto the desk. ‘Perhaps if you had the courage to drive it into your eye. Even then you would be more likely to blind yourself. Give up, Maxwell.’

‘No!’ Duo heaved himself upwards, trying to dislodge Heero, but Heero sat firm, letting gravity do his work for him. ‘No, I won’t! I don’t have to sit here and take this---this---’

‘This...?’ Heero raised an eyebrow. ‘This what?’

‘This _condescension!_ Not from _you!_ ’ Duo spat the words as if they were poison and he hoped they would burn smoking holes in Heero’s flesh.

‘Am I being condescending?’

‘You know damn well you are! All this talk about life having something for you! Well, it might for you but it sure as hell doesn’t for me and who are you to tell me I’m wrong? You don’t give a damn about me! You don’t give a flying fuck what I do unless it happens to get in your way!’

‘You are wrong, Maxwell.’

‘What?’

‘Think about what you’re saying.’

Duo glared at him, but did not speak.

‘I have just prevented you from committing suicide. You maintain that I don’t care what you do unless your actions will have an adverse effect on me, correct?’

Duo scowled again, but still didn’t answer.

Heero raised his eyebrows again. ‘Correct?’

‘Correct -- correct, you fuckin’ machine, correct!’ Duo writhed beneath him again, seeking vainly for a way to dislodge him.

‘Machine.’ Heero cocked his head, considered, and filed the comment away for further consideration, schooling himself to ignore Duo’s tensing and thrashing beneath him. ‘By your own logic, then, you are disproved.’ _Intellectual argument as anti-arousal technique._

‘What the hell are you talking about, Yuy? Speak human!’ Duo stopped thrashing around and merely glared.

‘By the mere fact of preventing you from killing yourself, I have admitted that what you do matters to me. Your existence or non-existence matters to me, otherwise I would not have bothered to stop you.’

Duo stared at him, mouth slightly open, angry tears drying on his cheeks. ‘I...’

‘And I am not a machine.’ Heero couldn’t resist. He looked down at Duo’s chest and hips, only a few inches, a very slight stretch, away from his hands. ‘Well-controlled, yes. A machine, no.’ Quite definitely not a machine in fact, but he could only hope that Duo’s emotional storm would keep him from noticing that Heero’s jeans weren’t quite as loose as they had been. If only one could control automatic reactions, life would be--

‘Heero...’

Startled out of his own thoughts, Heero looked up to meet Duo’s eyes. The other man blinked at him, opened his mouth to speak, shut it, tried again, shut it, tried again, and finally shut his mouth with a final click. He did not seem inclined to speak again.

Heero shrugged and let the silence go on. If what he had to do to keep Duo safe was to sit on his legs all night, well, then that was a sacrifice he was willing to make. He had done more unpleasant things in his time. He did not feel tired and he was certain he could remain awake until dawn. If this proved not to be the case, then WuFei’s room was just next door and he could probably rouse the other man with a thrown shoe or two.

‘Heero...I don’t...’ Duo licked his lips, looking almost anywhere but into Heero’s face. His dark eyes drifted around the room, across the ceiling, briefly crossed Heero’s glance, then seemed to root themselves on the third button of Heero’s shirt.

Heero felt a smile on his lips and also felt the twist that wanted to make it a cruel smirk. ‘Don’t worry, Maxwell. Your honor is safe in my hands. I am keeping you from harming yourself because I value you as a comrade and a friend.’ So much for not lying.

‘Oh.’

The quiet syllable sounded almost...disappointed? Heero ignored it. ‘I think if I were surrounded only by people who showed up on time for the meetings they had agreed to attend, I would be quite thoroughly bored by the end of the week.’

‘Oh.’ Duo nodded, swallowing hard against something in his throat. _Damn it, why does hope have to die so fuckin’ hard?_

‘Your flaws--’

‘Shut _up!_ ’ Duo lunged upwards, planting his hands on the bed and shoving himself up so that he was face to face with Heero. ‘Shut the fuck up! If the best I’m gonna get out of life is to be some kinda two bit character actor in someone else’s life then fuck it! I’m gonna go out in a blaze of glory!’

‘There would have been no blaze of glory, Maxwell,’ Heero said calmly, ‘merely a blaze.’

‘I don’t really fuckin’ care. If the only reason anyone wants me around is ‘cause I’m cute and funny and a little bit weird then they can find someone else to play the bit part fuckin’ weirdo!’ Duo shot upward, snake-fast, before Heero could react, and kissed him, pressing down hard against the other man’s mouth. Heero tried to pull back and found that one of Duo’s hands had tangled itself in his hair and wasn’t letting go. And, he had to admit, he wasn’t exactly eager for the chance. Duo tasted good, smelled good, felt good.

Duo pulled back after a minute, panting slightly, still glaring at Heero. ‘I want more than that!’

‘So why didn’t you ask for it?’ Heero let his iron control crack and leaned forward, caressing Duo’s cheek with one finger, tracing the curve of his earlobe, cupping the nape of his neck under the warm weight of his braid.

‘I didn’t want--’

Heero shot upright again, hands locked to his own knees, nerves tingling, staring straight ahead as if he had been abruptly called to attention. ‘ _Gomen nasai._ ’

Duo blinked at him. ‘What?’

Heero had to think for a second through the waves of guilt -- _I misunderstood. I should not have touched him._ \-- before the right English words arrived in his brain. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘For what?’ The ghost of a laugh escaped Duo. ‘Being the first person to touch me in years?’

‘What?’ Heero stared at him, completely nonplused now.

‘Heero, I haven’t touched someone--’ Duo pressed the fingers of his free hand flat against Heero’s chest, ‘-- not really touched someone since the doc picked me up and decided I was his new golden boy.’

Heero stared down at him for a long moment, only vaguely aware now of Duo’s fingers in his hair stroking long firm lines from the crown of his head to the top of his spine. He could hear his heartbeat pounding in his ears and he was almost certain that all of the nerve endings in his body were now concentrated between his thighs and in the patch of skin where Duo’s hand was resting on his breastbone. There were voices in his head -- tiny versions of Heero -- that were jumping up and down and screaming for his attention, screeching for him to look at the expression in Duo’s eyes, feel the pressure of his hand, lean forward and kiss him for fuck’s sake! But--but---

‘ _Yamatte._ ’ He reached up and grabbed Duo’s hands, pushing them away.

‘What?’ Duo looked genuinely confused now.

‘If all you want is sex, then--’

‘Good Christ, Yuy--’ Confusion changed to insult. ‘You don’t understand much, do you?’

The insult, combined with Duo’s expression of half-anger, half-pity, served to undo the tenuous grip Heero had regained on his selfcontrol. ‘No! I do not understand! I do not understand a great deal about people who would seek to destroy themselves without stopping to ask if their deaths would serve to isolate others or to leave someone else lonely and afraid without even the refuge of fantasy to escape into. I do not understand that, Maxwell, nor do I want to!’

‘Heero, I--’ Duo reached out, but Heero smacked his hand away.

‘You never asked me if I cared about you and I thought you would not care to know. You always seemed sufficient in and of yourself -- you did not seem to need anyone else. How was I supposed to guess?’ Heero leaned slowly forward, forcing Duo further and further back until the other man was lying at full stretch across the bed. ‘What was I supposed to do? Tell you I loved you one morning when I handed you your coffee?’

Duo swallowed hard again, the expression in his eyes changing so fast Heero could not keep up. ‘Loved...me? Heero, I never--’

Heero burst in before Duo could finish his sentence, humiliation, anger, guilt, love and long-repressed desire all jostling for expression. ‘If all you want is a quick lay to reaffirm that you are alive then, by God, I will give it to you, but it will be with your complete understanding that it is not what I want!’ Heero pushed his hips against Duo’s, surrendering for a moment to the messages that his body was urgently sending him. The pressure sent a sharp wave of pleasure up to his throat and it took all that remained of his self-control not to cry out.

Duo’s eyes went wide, the pupils dilating to huge pools of black. ‘What...what do you want then?’

Heero’s voice clogged in his throat as dozens of ideas, dozens of needs, struggled to be expressed at once. ‘I want...I want...’ He couldn’t pick out a single idea to express first and he subsided back onto Duo’s thighs with a groan, feeling suddenly heavy, old, and tired.

‘Do you know what I want?’ Duo’s voice broke in on his struggle.

‘What?’

‘I want someone to tell me I’m a better person than I think I am. I want someone who’s going to tell me that every morning and every night. I want someone to tell me that I’m not just a deathdealing psychopath who should be stuck up on a scaffold for the world to jeer at.’ Duo’s voice broke and he had to stop for a second to find it again. ‘I thought, once, maybe, just after the war ended, that maybe you....but you never even looked at me twice! And I wanted you to! Christ, how I wanted you to! You and...’ Duo’s voice disappeared again in a fresh wave of tears and he waved one hand over his head.

Heero glanced in the direction he was pointing and frowned. The only thing in that direction was the wall and it was impossible Duo had desired the wall. On the same principle, Heero discounted his plain wooden dresser, coat rack, and spare pair of boots. So something beyond the wall. Beyond the wall was... ‘WuFei?’

Duo nodded, pressing his hands over his face. ‘Stupid, ain’t it? In a world filled with gorgeous guys, I gotta end up living with two of the most beautiful, unavailable men ever! But it’s perfectly safe if I want them both because neither of them is ever even going to fucking sneeze at me!’ He uncovered his face, glaring up at Heero through a haze of tears. ‘Every now and then you’d look at me and I’d think maybe, maybe this time -- but you never followed through and you never...he never...no-one fucking ever!’ He gritted his teeth hard together, then his eyes popped open. ‘But you kissed me back.’

‘Duo---’

‘No, no, no...’ Duo pushed himself up onto his elbows. ‘No, no, wait -- I may be out of it, I might be borderline fucking suicidal but I’m not stupid and you kissed me back!’

‘Duo---’

‘What?’

‘I think you are...’ Heero hesitated for a long moment, trying to choose a word carefully. ‘Tired. And confused and unhappy and I think perhaps you are not in a good position to make decisions about what you want.’

‘What?’ Duo was staring at him, mouth hanging slightly open.

‘I do know what I want.’ Heero took a deep breath, lining up the words he was going to say before he spoke them. Of all the ways to confess love... ‘I want you. I have wanted you for...for some months. I want you in my bed and you are already in my heart.’

‘Heero---’ Duo reached out towards him, but Heero caught his hand and steered it away.

‘If you wish, you can remain here tonight. But I...there will be...we will not touch.’

‘What?’ Duo tilted his head, looking sideways at the bed he was lying on. ‘I can stay here -- in this teeny tiny little thing you call a bed -- but we’re not going to touch?’ A wicked smile touched his lips and he rocked his hips slightly under Heero. ‘What do you think we’re doing now?’

Heero swallowed the groan before it could leave his lips and pressed down hard on Duo’s hips, forcing him to be still. ‘Not tonight. I...would not feel right.’

Duo hesitated for a long minute, some part of his brain realising all the things that were going unmentioned, undiscussed, then nodded. ‘But...but you’re not gonna leave me alone?’ A shadow of the fear that had been in his eyes all night crossed his face.

Heero shook his head again. ‘No. I will not leave you alone.’ He pushed himself upward and backward, freeing Duo’s legs, and tried to think cooling thoughts. Much to his relief, his jeans were more concealing than he had thought. Duo lay where he was for a minute, then sat upright, hair a wild mess around his face.

‘Are you tired?’

Duo thought for a minute, looking down at his body as if it were written on one of his limbs. ‘Exhausted.’

Heero nodded and pulled down a corner of the bedclothes. ‘Go to sleep. I have a program I wish to finish and I am not tired enough to sleep yet.’

A smile hovered over Duo’s mouth for a minute. ‘You and that laptop.’

‘I believe you once referred to me as a technosexual?’ Heero sat down at his desk, flicking the laptop open. Behind him he could hear sounds of cloth on cloth as Duo pulled the blankets down, then near-silence and some quiet sounds he knew were cloth on skin. He shut his eyes and found his imagination was only too happy to present him with a vivid image of Duo, semi-naked, an inviting smile on his lips, and snapped his eyes open again.

‘The first of a new breed. Well,’ Duo’s voice was accompanied by the sound of the bed creaking and the rearranging of sheets and blankets, ‘the first and last really, since true technosexuals don’t ever actually meet other humans.’

‘Hn. Go to sleep, Duo.’ Heero turned his attention firmly to the computer and tried to lose himself in the intricacies of the database he was constructing. Unfortunately, his imagination refused to be derailed and kept inventing scenarios whereby he could have had Duo naked and panting by now. He swallowed hard, trying to keep his mouth from feeling dry, and tried to shut off the vivid pictures in his head: Duo, shirtless, hair unbraided and snaking down over his back and shoulders, caressing his pale skin... Duo spreadeagled on the bedcover, one hand between his legs, the other at his lips... Duo, with the smile on his lips Heero had only seen once or twice when Duo thought no-one else was looking, but this time Duo was looking at him, at Heero, waiting for Heero... Similar images had been troubling him on and off since he realised his attraction for the other man, but he had always found them controllable before, fantasy fodder, nothing more, especially once he realised his attraction ran beyond the level of mere sexual want. _But Duo was never asleep in my bed before._

He kept himself at the laptop more through force of will than by any interest in what he was programming and, after what seemed like a minor eternity, his brain finally agreed to think about the program instead of about Duo.

* * *

Glancing up at the clock, he realised that it was after midnight. He had been working at his laptop for over two hours. The program was finished, the house silent about him.

He took a long stretch as he turned around towards the bed -- and stopped, frozen in place. Duo was curled on his side, head pillowed on one hand, deeply asleep. The covers were down around his waist and Heero’s imagination immediately kicked into high gear again, gleefully coming up with a stream of metaphors to describe what he was seeing: creamy skin, taut muscles, eyelashes like strokes of ink, brown hair threaded with gold— Heero took a deep breath and reined his thoughts back in.

He stripped quickly, giving himself no time to think. It took him a few minutes to find his pajama pants lying in a pile of laundry in the corner but he pulled them on before he could consider the decision. If Duo was naked under the blankets, then Heero was completely unconvinced of his own ability to remain in control if he, too, was nude.

He clicked off the light and pulled the sheets down far enough that he had just enough room to slide between them. Next to him, Duo sighed and muttered something in his sleep, turning away from him.

Heero lay straight as a board, staring up at the ceiling, trying not to notice the warm body lying next to him. Duo was not naked, thank God. There must’ve been a pair of pajamas lying on the bed or at the footboard or something because he was quite definitely clothed from the waist down. Not that that made things entirely easier.

 _Breathe. Think of this as a camping trip. A safehouse necessity._ That didn’t help. That made him think of one night he, Trowa and Duo had spent in the tiniest safehouse he had ever been in in his life. Trowa had spent most of the night repairing some damage to Heavyarms. Duo fell asleep curled on the only bed in the place and Heero had nothing else to do, nothing else to occupy his mind, but watch Duo sleep. He had never ached so badly in his life as he had that night — wanting to touch Duo’s hair, his hand, his shoulder, see the man wake up, smile — in the end, he had to go out and fabricate something to do on Wing.

 _Think of logarithmic tables._ That did work -- it was impossible to remain aroused while reciting log tables backwards. Just as the numbers were beginning to slide together into one giant mess at the bottom of the hill towards which he, too, was sliding, he felt the bed shift and a hand slide over his stomach. Instantly, his eyes were open and he was as awake as he had ever been in his life.

‘...Heero...’

‘I’m here, Duo. I promised.’ He slid his fingers between Duo’s, at the same time trapping the other man’s hand and satisfying his own desire for some modicum of physical contact.

Duo coughed, clearing his throat, turning back towards Heero. ‘...what time’s it?’

‘About one in the morning. Go back to sleep.’

‘...early...’

‘Or late. Go to sleep.’ Heero closed his eyes resolutely.

Duo was silent for a minute then, with a long sigh, he suddenly molded himself against Heero from ankle to shoulder. Heero’s eyes shot wide and he only barely managed to keep from gasping aloud. Duo was warm, only half-naked, but what a half... Heero’s body didn’t care about the half -- all it cared about was that it was being touched. By Duo.

‘...new day, then...’

‘What?’ Heero’s voice came out more as a croak.

Duo smiled against his shoulder. ‘...s’ a new day..not last night anymore..’

There was a second hand now, trailing over Heero’s shoulder and sweeping gently over one nipple, then tweaking the other. Heero felt his fingers clench tight around Duo’s and the other man responded, clasping his hand firmly.

‘Duo...’ Heero edged away very slightly, curving his body away from Duo’s invasive fingers. He felt Duo still immediately, almost freeze.

‘What?’ There was an edge of fear in Duo’s voice, more than an edge in the rigor of his muscles.

‘I don’t want to hurt you.’

Duo smiled again, muscles relaxing in a rush, and kissed the pad of muscle at the top of Heero’s shoulder. ‘Then don’t. I’m not all that into pain.’

‘No, I mean---’ Heero kept himself pulled away.

‘I know what you mean, Yuy. You don’t want me to do something when I’m not fully aware of myself or the consequences or my reasons or your liabilities or whatever phrase you’re currently using to mean you’re afraid and you think I’m not thinking.’

‘I am not--!’

‘Yes, you are.’ Duo slid closer again, pressing his thigh against Heero’s, a solid band of muscle Heero ached to rub against. ‘I can feel you being afraid. You go all...stiff and funny and not in a good way.’

‘Maxwell, I---’

‘I want you, Yuy. I want to kiss you and hold you and touch you and I am not psychotic or compensating or lying or out of my mind or any other damn foolish thing you can think of. I have wanted to touch you for months.’ Duo sighed against Heero’s shoulder, the warm draft of breath making the small hairs on Heero’s skin stand erect. ‘It makes my head hurt when I think about all the nights I laid awake thinking about you and you laid awake thinking about me...Christ...so fucking stupid...’

He went on, in a tone so low that he was almost talking to himself, ‘What was I thinking...God, if this is what life’s like, then I’m never gonna die...’ He took a deep breath and said, a little more loudly, ‘I like knowing things with my whole body, Yuy. I like being touched.’

‘Then why haven’t you...sought anyone out?’ The words relieved a sore spot in Heero’s thoughts. He hated to admit that every time Duo had left the house, had been out of his sight, he had been imagining nights of passion with other men, other women, Duo’s nights that he would never share, Duo’s skin he would never taste, convulsions through Duo’s body that he would never see. He hated to admit it, but it was true. And there was something nagging at him now -- some thought in the back of his mind that was having a hard time making itself heard over the hum produced by the closeness of Duo’s body.

‘I tried. I did try.’ Duo laughed, a hard bitter sound. ‘Am I such a great fucking prize? Who’d want me, Yuy?’

‘I do.’ Heero turned over reflexively, one hand sliding out to find Duo’s shoulder in the dark. ‘I do.’

Duo purred, a low sound in his throat, and pressed close to Heero again, rubbing up against him like a cat, chest to chest. ‘Then show me...’

Heero bit his lip hard, squeezing his eyes shut. _Oh, God, oh, God..._ His moral sense was in rebellion -- this was wrong, it was taking advantage of Duo to please the baser side of his own desires, it was wrong— But...but Duo was asking, how could that be wrong? ‘I---’

Duo sighed gently again, nodding against Heero’s shoulder, his hand still playing idly on Heero’s muscular stomach, tracing concentric circles around his navel. Sliding a few inches south, he found the drawstring of Heero’s pants and wound it around his thumb, tugging gently.

‘Okay, all right...okay, how’s this?’ He stretched up, nipping at Heero’s chin then, when the other man dropped his head slightly, kissing him, whispering into his mouth rather than speaking aloud: ‘You stay clothed. I stay clothed. Nothing heavy, not tonight. Just...please don’t stay over there like a little Heero Yuy-shaped ice cube. Let me see what I get...please? I hate waiting for my presents.’

Heero was finding it increasingly hard to think objectively about what was being offered him. Duo’s lips were a distraction he didn’t want to relinquish. Duo tasted of chocolate and oranges and warm sweet salt and Heero was beginning to have very distinct ideas about tongues and lips and the hours on end that could be spent investigating those activities. But there were still those nagging thoughts in the back of his mind and he wanted a minute’s quiet to listen to them. ‘Duo---I...’

He must have sounded more urgent than he meant to, because Duo froze in place, one hand on his stomach, the other on his shoulder, looking up at Heero’s face in the dim light. ‘I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to, Yuy. I promise.’

‘I...oh, God...’ Heero dropped his head, giving in for just one second -- just one, he promised himself -- to the magnetic pull of Duo’s lips.

Duo hummed happily and, as soon as Heero gave him the breathing room, murmured, ‘You won’t regret this, lover, I promise...no regrets at all...’ _I’ll be so good._ He slid his long fingers under Heero’s waistband for a tantalising second, brushing lightly over the hardening length between Heero’s thighs.

Heero groaned and involuntarily pushed up against his hand before he could control himself. ‘Duo...I....’ He pulled himself back together with an effort, feeling sweat prick out under his arms and on his forehead. _God...I can’t..._

‘What?’ Duo did not move his hand, but lowered his head, running his tongue around one of Heero’s nipples, sucking it into his mouth, then releasing it with a barely audible pop.

‘I never...no, Duo....listen...I haven’t...’

‘What, Heero?’ Duo tilted his head, trying to hear if there were actual words in the gasps of Heero’s voice.

‘I’ve never...’ Heero took a deep breath, forcing his body to be still. ‘I haven’t...not another man...’

‘What?’ Duo frowned, not sure of what he was hearing. Surely Heero couldn’t mean....

‘I don’t know what to do.’ The whisper was embarrassed, almost as if Heero hoped not to be heard. ‘I never...I was going to look it up tomorrow.’

Duo’s sudden burst of laughter took Heero entirely by surprise and he felt offended and more than a little humiliated.

‘God, Heero -- you’re the only guy I know who’d rather learn about sex from a textbook than another person!’ Duo shook his head against Heero’s chest, loose hairs tickling Heero’s collarbone.

‘I’m sorry.’ Heero was aware he sounded tight, offended, perhaps even angry, but he didn’t really care. Had he thought Duo would laugh at him, make him feel foolish, then he would have kept silence. But of course Duo would think him silly -- Duo had been so clear about his previous sexual history, so uninhibited about his locker room stories--

‘Don’t be sorry..’ Duo stopped laughing, took one last deep breath and let it out slowly, letting the last giggles ease out of his system. ‘Don’t be sorry, Heero -- I shouldn’t have laughed. Just...’ He pushed himself closer to Heero again, reassuring himself that the other man was, in fact, more than responsive. ‘Just...think about what feels good, okay? You don’t need a book to teach you that...just...pay attention...okay?’

‘So...’ Heero strangled the small mental critic and buried it. Then he slid down in the bed, easing down so that he and Duo were face to face, then cupping Duo’s face with one hand and kissing him gently, a careful press of lips. ‘So...that?’

Duo nodded, smiling against Heero’s mouth. ‘That.’

‘All right...what about...’ Heero pressed his lips over Duo’s again, but this time he let his mouth open a little, the tip of his tongue tracing the edge of Duo’s lower lip, tasting the saltsweet of the other man’s skin. ‘...that?’

Duo was a little out of breath that time. ‘That. Definitely that.’

‘Good.’ Heero slid his hand into Duo’s hair, winding his fingers through the loops of his braid, feeling the silky strands fine and soft against his skin. When they kissed again, Heero felt Duo’s teeth smooth against his tongue and he could hear and feel Duo’s soft moan as their tongues touched, then parted. The sound, the vibration made his nerves tingle and hum down into his hands and they suddenly itched to be doing something, touching something.

Duo must have noticed the change in Heero’s body, because he guided Heero’s free hand to his chest, teasing his own nipple with the other man’s fingers for a minute.

‘Can I...?’ Heero murmured, not sure if their lips were still touching or not.

‘Please...’ Duo moaned again as Heero pinched one nipple into a sharp, hard peak. ‘Has anyone ever told you that you kiss like a god?’

‘No.’ Heero smiled against Duo’s mouth, tongue flicking out to tease Duo’s lips.

‘You do. Put it on your resume.’ Duo’s tongue, in return, traced the outline of Heero’s mouth, then dived inside, Duo just as eager to taste Heero as Heero had been to taste him.

‘Under what? Job experience?’ Heero bit Duo’s lower lip gently as he swept his hand across the smooth plane of Duo’s chest.

‘...associated skills...’

‘But would I really want to work for a boss who wanted those skills?’ Heero lowered his head, flicking his tongue over Duo’s erect nipple.

‘Oh, God....well....uh...’ Duo dragged in a deep breath, trying like hell to keep himself thrusting his hips against Heero’s thigh. ‘...well, maybe...it might be interesting...You never know what perks a job like that might have.’

Heero let his fingers trail over Duo’s back, finding the lines of bruises and avoiding them carefully. But there were apparently vast planes of muscle that begged to be touched, caressed, stroked, smoothed. Duo purred under his touch and Heero would have sworn that his skin became softer and warmer.

Duo dropped his head slowly, kissing a wandering trail down Heero’s throat and breastbone. ‘Are you sure your clothes have to stay on...’ He slid down further, kissing a tiny line around the top of Heero’s waistband.

Heero squeezed his eyes shut, commanding all the voices in his head currently screaming _no, God no, hell no, what the hell was i thinking, take them off now to shut up._ ‘...yes...’

‘Why, lover...don’t tell me you’re shy...’ Duo’s mouth pressed warm and hot between Heero’s legs and Heero was momentarily unable to think. All he wanted to do was press up, have the cloth magically disappear, feel what Duo’s lips and tongue might do on his exposed skin.

‘Not shy...’ he panted finally, reaching down and yanking Duo back up to his level.

‘What then?’ Duo was licking his lips, grinning devilishly at him. ‘You shouldn’t have anything to be ashamed of with all that between your thighs.’ As if to make his point clearer, he pressed his hand against Heero’s length, caressing the hidden tip with his thumb.

A hundred things rushed through Heero’s mind: _touch me not shy not shy please god touch me please please before i burst please afraid so afraid he’ll laugh he won’t love me was just lying just a joke please touch me anyway please_ He thrust his own hands forward blindly, pressing one hand flat over Duo’s heart as if he could shove understanding through the other man’s skin. The other hand hit Duo’s hip more or less by accident and slid inward, guided by the slant of Duo’s body; Heero’s fingers brushed something hard, harder than muscle, a firmness he wanted to touch, stroke, caress. Duo gasped, choking out a word Heero didn’t hear clearly, and pushed forward against Heero’s fingers.

‘See...’ Duo got out after a few seconds, ‘See, this is all so much better if we’re naked..’

‘No...’ What did he say?

Duo half-moaned, half-pouted as Heero pulled his hand back. ‘Lover...why so stubborn? If you’re going to deny me every little thing...’

‘What am I denying you?’

Duo pushed into his chest, eyes closed, hands clutching onto Heero as if he was saving him from drowning. ‘Feel...want to feel you, not this--’ One hand plucked at Heero’s waistband. ‘...not this stupid stuff...want you...want to feel you...’

‘Tomorrow night, Duo...’ Heero promised, letting his chin rest on the top of Duo’s head. _Heefei...heefei? that isn’t a word, that’s---WuFei._ The nagging thought resolved itself and Heero felt his heart sink, suddenly cold space invading his chest, sinking down through his limbs, killing the throb between his legs. ‘Tomorrow night.’ _If you’re still here._ He closed his eyes, picturing WuFei in his mind with technical clarity and shook his head. _No-one could find the both of us attractive at once. And it is impossible to love two at once._

Duo opened his eyes, eyelashes brushing against Heero’s chest, and stared into the darkness in front of him. He could smell Heero’s skin, hear the other man’s breathing -- hell, if he changed position a little, he would be able to hear his heartbeat. And he was damn sure he knew what the other man was thinking. He could nearly taste the misery crystallizing out on his skin like sweat. _Thinks I’m playin’ him. Thinks I want a quick fuck to make myself feel better and then I’m outta here. Maybe even I set him up to get him into bed. Goddamn stupid bastard....can’t take a compliment if you handed it to him on a goddamn silver plate._ ‘Heero.’

‘What?’

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing is wrong, Maxwell.’

Duo snorted. ‘Don’t kid the kidder, Yuy. You’ve gone from being stiff in...’ He couldn’t resist a wriggle against Heero’s hips. Yup, something was definitely wrong -- what had been a promising erection was now slowly wilting away. _Damn it._ ‘...stiff in interesting ways to just being plain old stiff. What’d I do?’ _I barely touched him!_ Duo could feel the waves of blackness, pushed back by sleep and impending sexual bliss with a man he’d crushed on for a year, creeping back slowly.

‘Duo. Earlier...you mentioned...Chang.’

 _Hell. Hell on bricks. Hell on toast. Hell on wheels. Jesus H. Christ on a crutch in a bucket._ ‘Yes?’

‘I...’

‘Yuy, do I lie?’

‘What?’

‘Do I lie? Ever?’

‘Ah---’

‘Be careful how you answer this.’ Duo poked him in the ribs.

‘No.’ Heero wriggled away from Duo’s finger. ‘No. You are not a liar. Generally speaking you will only stretch the truth for comedic or dramatic effect and then only on very rare---’ Heero stopped talking with a grunt as Duo jabbed him in the ribs again.

‘Shut up. You’re ruining my point.’

‘ _Gomen._ ’ Heero lay quiet, waiting.

Duo sighed, pressing his cheek against Heero’s breast, hearing the steady thud thud of his heart for a reassuring second or two. _Who’d’ve thought the perfect soldier would be this delicate?_ The answer came immediately. _Me. I should’ve thought._ ‘So I don’t lie, right?’

‘That is what we have just established.’

‘So if I tell you I love you, then---’

‘Then I would be forced to accept this as the truth you believe at the moment.’

‘At the moment?’ Duo sat up, covers falling away from him, indignation shining so bright and hot in his head he thought he could probably light up the room. ‘At the moment? What the hell is that supposed to fucking mean, Yuy? At the fucking moment?’

Heero lay quietly on the sheet, moving his torso slightly so that he lay straight, arms, legs and chest forming a nearly perfect rectangle. Some part of Duo’s mind was busily categorizing Heero’s body as seen by this dim light -- the golden sheen his skin took on, the dark glints that indicated where his eyes were, the soft shadows delineating chest and stomach muscles and the angles of his hips, shadows Duo longed to drop down and taste. It took a major effort of will not to push his thigh between Heero’s and slide down his body, kissing a long slow path down to-- _No. Uh-huh. Not thinking about that right now. Later maybe._

‘At the moment, Maxwell, means at the moment.’

‘You’re still on your _Maxwell’s emotionally disturbed kick,_ aren’t you?’ Duo tossed his braid back over his shoulder.

‘You did just attempt to commit suicide, Maxwell. It is not usually the sign of a wellbalanced system.’

‘You--’ Duo took a deep breath, restraining himself from lambasting Heero up one side and down the other with any words in any language that happened to occur to him -- then a wicked, and potentially more enjoyable, idea occurred to him. ‘Do you know how many rhymes for Yuy exist in the English language?’

‘What?’ Heero blinked at him.

‘How many rhymes for Yuy.’

‘Very few, I would imagine. I have never done a systematic search of the English language or rhymes for my own name. Perhaps Japanese or Chinese would prove more fruitful---’

‘Stepping on my point again.’

‘No, I understand your point. You are about to tell me you wrote poetry either to me or for me. I am flattered.’

Duo frowned, picking at the sheet with the hand that wasn’t supporting him. This wasn’t going right. ‘How did you know?’

Heero shrugged very slightly, shaking an errant lock of hair out of his eyes. ‘A fortunate guess.’

To hell with subtlty. ‘What the fuck is wrong with you, Yuy?’ Duo spread his arms wide, then let the fingers of one hand slide down his chest under the waistband of his loose pants, fingers tracing his own length, knowing Heero could see what he was doing. He bit his lip, indulging himself with a firm stroke or two, enough to keep himself hot, but not nearly enough to get off -- _God, if that were Heero..._ \-- then pulled his hand back. He could see Heero watching him, but his chest didn’t seem to alter its steady rise and fall. ‘I wasn’t planning on letting you out of this bed until this time tomorrow.’

‘Are you sure even your athleticism will be able to keep pace with your desire?’

Duo grinned at him. ‘With you around? Hell, yeah!’ He could see Heero’s smile but still, bafflingly, there was that hint of sadness in the other man’s voice.

‘Then you had better take advantage of your time, don’t you think?’ Heero’s hands lifted, slid down his body, thumbs hooked under the elastic of his waistband--

‘Whoa, hey — no!’ Duo clamped his fingers over Heero’s, holding him in midmotion.

‘I thought this was what you wanted.’ Heero looked up at him and, had Heero been anyone else, Duo would have sworn there were tears in his eyes.

‘Yeah, I...’ Duo stared down at his hands holding Heero’s in place. _What the hell am I doing? If he wants to get naked, let him! Three cheers for naked Heero Yuy!_ He looked up at Heero’s face again. He could feel the tension radiating out of Heero’s muscles -- tension, desperation, misery all welling up out of his skin into an acid tangle Duo could almost taste. ‘I do but...Christ, Yuy, not like this!’ He released Heero’s hands with a snap of his wrists. ‘Not like you’re some goddamned sacrifice I’m supposed to chew up and spit out!’

Heero looked up at him, his expression of calm still unmoved. ‘I apologize for not being the man you desire but---’

A lightbulb of sheer anger went off in Duo’s head and he picked up his pillow, hurling it across the room as hard as he could. ‘The man I desire? The man I---goddamnit, Yuy, you _are_ the fucking man I fucking desire! I have fucking desired you for a fucking _year!_ ’

‘I am speaking of Chang.’

‘Chang? Who the hell — oh—’ The lightbulb went off again and Duo sagged down onto the bed. ‘Oh.’

‘I am, however, willing to be a stand-in for you, rather than see you suffer.’ Heero spoke as calmly as if he had been discussing exchanging spare parts from one Gundam to another.

‘A stand-in...’ Duo felt his jaw drop and he stared at Heero. ‘A stand...’ He doesn’t understand. Some little part of Duo’s brain that wasn’t hazed by physical need or lost in the approaching waves of darkness chimed in. _He doesn’t understand what you meant when you said you loved both of them. He’s never loved anyone -- never had anyone to love him. How could he understand? He thinks you’re taking him because you can’t get WuFei._ ‘Shit, Yuy...I...’

‘I understand, Maxwell.’ Heero was leaning up now, one hand on Duo’s thigh, supporting himself on his elbow. The hand on thigh slid inwards, Heero’s fingers folding cloth around Duo’s length, as expertly as if he did this every day. Duo, momentarily stunned by sensation, didn’t move, didn’t speak for a second, then---

‘Yuy!’ He grabbed Heero’s hand, pulling it away.

‘What?’ Heero froze, his hand suspended in midair. ‘Did I do something wrong?’

Duo took quick stock of the sensation coming in from his extremities. ‘No.’ He took a deep breath, shook his head to clear the faint sound of buzzing, then smiled at Heero. ‘No, you didn’t do anything wrong. That was...that was just right, but I have to explain something to you first.’

‘What? I believe I understand the theory of this now.’ Heero’s fingers began to creep inwards again, but this time Duo was quicker, intertwining his fingers with Heero’s and holding the other man’s hand in both his own.

‘No, Yuy, listen to me.’

Heero lay back patiently.

‘When I said...what I said about WuFei, I...’ Duo hesitated. How the hell was he going to explain this in a way Heero would understand. ‘I don’t want you as a stand in. You’re not second best. I’m not settling for you. I...I wanted you for you. I want you for you.’

‘But--’

‘But what?’

‘How can that be the case? If you also...have feelings for Chang--’

‘Christ, Heero, don’t you like more than one person at a time? Can’t you like me and Trowa and Quatre and WuFei all at once?’

‘Yes, but that is not the same.’ Heero rearranged himself slightly on the bed, pulling up a blanket to cover his legs. ‘I believe you were confessing to having...feelings of a sexual nature for both Chang and myself.’

‘And you don’t think that’s possible?’ Duo sat back on his heels, feeling his desire fading by the second. _This is better than a cold shower._

Heero shook his head. ‘Not at all. I have been given to believe that it is entirely possible to desire more than one person at a time. However, I have also observed that this kind of behavior is usually the result of some sort of confusion in the individual concerned--’

‘Christ, Yuy, could you use some more multisyllabic words? Just a few?’ Duo let his head sink down to rest on his hand. ‘I’ve had a long day, y’know.’

‘I apologize.’

‘Let me sum up in human language -- you think I just can’t make up my mind which one of you I’m really hot for and I’m taking you because you’re here and, you being the damaged little Heero Yuy we all know and love, you think that automatically means you’re not the one I love because that’s how the world works for you, right?’ Duo cocked his head, watching Heero. ‘Right?’

Heero was silent for a long minute, then nodded, a short, sharp downward jerk of the chin -- nothing more. ‘I am willing to accept the loss of my fantasies if--’

‘Yuy.’ Duo swung a leg over Heero’s, perching on his hips. He realised this gave him a somewhat unfair advantage, since he had Heero pinned and...somewhat vulnerable but, at the minute he didn’t care. ‘Shut up and listen to me, okay?’

Heero shut up.

‘I don’t want a sacrifice. I don’t want you as a sacrifice. I don’t want little chipped off bits of your heart because you think that’s all I have room for -- I want the whole goddamn thing so I can hug it and caress it and stitch it back together where you’ve ripped it into pieces.’ Duo pressed his hands palm-down on Heero’s chest, locking gazes with the other man. ‘I love you and I want you and I’m sorry if that doesn’t compute for you. And I’m sorry if you can’t understand that I love WuFei, too, and I sure as hell didn’t mean to fall for the both of you but I did -- and I’m goddamned if I’m going to walk away without telling you this at least a dozen fucking times so that you can try to fucking well understand!’

Heero swallowed, the muscles moving down his throat in tight waves. ‘ _Demo..._ ’

‘ _Demo_ what, you stubborn bastard?’

‘I dreamed...I wanted...’ Heero stopped, eyes closed.

‘What?’ Duo’s fingers clenched against Heero’s smooth skin. He could feel the darkness coming back over him, like waves breaking over rock. If Heero retreated now, if he didn’t let Duo try--- ‘C’mon, Yuy. Please?’

‘I want to hold you for more than one night.’ Heero’s voice was hoarse, choked. ‘I want--’

‘And if you don’t,’ Duo said conversationally, stroking the side of Heero’s face with one finger, ‘if you’re not in this bed cuddling my ass by nine o’clock tomorrow night, then I’m gonna get Hilde and she’s gonna come down here and help me beat the shit out of you.’

Heero’s eyes shot wide, showing a sparkle of tears Duo knew he had better not mention ever having seen. ‘What?’

‘You think you’re gettin’ away with a one-night stand? Is that what you think all this means? I’m just tellin’ you about Chang so I have an excuse to fuck you and leave?’ Duo ran his hands over Heero’s chest, lost in marvel for a minute that such a gorgeous man, such a smart man in every other way, could be so astoundingly dense. ‘Think again, Yuy. You saved my life, now you’re fuckin’ stuck with it. I’ve got wasted time to make up for.’ Duo took a deep breath, blinking back his own tears, shoving back the voices of reservation shouting that his wasn’t a life worth saving. ‘Sorry if you thought you were gettin’ off with a one-time fuck. That isn’t what I want.’ He swallowed hard, now feeling tension wrack his own muscles. If Heero said no, told him to leave, laughed, didn’t understand, didn’t try to understand--

Heero stared at him for a long minute, face unreadable in the half-light, then catapulted upwards with startling speed, shoving Duo over on his back and bending over him, straddling his thighs.

Duo gasped as he hit the pillow, air popping out of his throat. ‘In case no-one told you, Yuy, there are these things we use called _words--_ ’

Heero leaned close, lips moving on Duo’s cheek as he spoke. ‘I love you. I want you. May I show you?’

Duo swallowed, eyes wide, feeling all the chill leave his body. ‘I thought you were the one who said you needed a classroom course---’ _God, all he’s gonna have to do is touch me once and it’s all over..._

‘I suddenly feel...inspired to independent study.’

‘Well,’ Duo wriggled his shoulders to a more comfortable position and grinned up at Heero, ‘far be it from me to impede your edu--’ The end of his sentence and whatever reservations still remained were lost to posterity as Heero simultaneously kissed him and slid a hand down between his thighs. Duo arched upwards, all thought of unhappiness disappearing in a burst of flame that started where Heero’s fingers were wrapping around him through cloth.

‘You’ll have to tell me if I am misunderstanding the course material,’ Heero murmured, flicking Duo’s earlobe with the tip of his tongue.

‘...uh-huh...’ Duo was surprised to hear his own voice. He’d been sure the power of speech had been removed permanently from his brain to make room for physical sensation. All he could feel was warm -- warm skin above him, Heero’s chest pressing against his, warm legs against and between his own, warm hands on his hips... ‘...you’re doing...oh, God...fine...Heero....’

‘What?’

‘No, Christ, don’t stop...I didn’t say stop...’ Duo managed to get some control back over his passion-fuzzed brain and became aware that his hands were clenched over Heero’s shoulders. _That’s not fair._

Heero closed his eyes, tongue between his lips, concentrating on the feeling of Duo under him, Duo’s hands sliding down his back, Duo’s mouth under his, Duo’s hands... ‘...Maxwell...’ A reproving growl.

‘...please...’ Duo’s fingers teased at the elastic waistband. ‘...please let me...I want to feel you...please...don’t be afraid of me...please, Heero...’

Heero squeezed his eyes tight shut and nodded. He felt Duo’s grin against his shoulder.

‘Pay attention, then. This is a neat party trick...and a one, and a two, and a...’

 _Three._ Some part of Heero’s brain continued the countdown although, at the minute, he couldn’t have said what part. Duo was naked. He was naked. Naked on top of Duo who was also... _oh, God_... He heard a throaty groan and was surprised to realise it came from his own throat. He was aching, swollen, and he was certain that if Duo moved so much as another inch---

Duo chuckled, a low sound in his ear. ‘Don’t come yet, okay, lover?’

The sound snapped Heero slightly out of his trance of skin and he realised he was still moaning, pushing against Duo. He bit his lip, pulling back a little. ‘What?’

‘Don’t come yet.’

‘Don’t come where?’ Heero dragged in a deep breath. Why did Duo want him to go somewhere? Was the bed insufficient in some way?

‘What? Are you being difficult on purpose, Yuy?’

‘No.’

‘Don’t---’ Duo laughed. ‘Oh, don’t tell me you don’t know what that means!’ He grinned up at Heero. ‘Really?’

‘Don’t know what what means, Maxwell?’ Heero frowned down at him, propping his weight on his hands. ‘Is this really a good time for word games?’

‘Call it part of your independent study.’ Duo stretched up and kissed him, sliding one hand between their bodies as he did so. ‘Coming--’

Heero choked, his head falling onto Duo’s shoulder as Duo’s fingers wrapped around his length and stroked gently.

‘...is what you want to do when I do that to your cock...’ Duo smiled against his lover’s cheek, pressing a light kiss on his earlobe.

‘Incorrect...word...’ Heero gasped out, trying to thrust himself into the loose tunnel formed by Duo’s fingers.

‘What?’ Duo’s hand went slack entirely and Heero let out a moan of frustration. ‘Are you kidding me, Yuy? I’m trying to give you a handjob and you’re telling me I’m using the wrong words?’

‘Yes. To come is a verb...’ Heero pushed his thigh between Duo’s, biting his lip a little as the cold bottom sheet hit skin that was far too hot. Then Duo was against him, one long hard hot press up his thigh and the cold sheet was forgotten. ‘...I believe you are trying to describe an orgasm.’

‘For fuck’s sake, Yuy...’

‘And I believe a cock is generally a rooster...’ Heero traced his finger gently over Duo’s tip, feeling the drop of moisture spread out over the tight, delicate skin.

‘Are you really...’ Duo had to stop to get his breath, and try again. ‘Are you really going to choose this time to give me a vocabulary lesson?’ He tightened his fingers around Heero, stretching one finger out to brush against a pucker of muscle that made Heero choke.

‘Yes!’ Heero pressed his thighs close around Duo’s leg, giving in to the urge to push into Duo’s hand, against his body, against anything that would give him friction.

‘Lover, lover...’ Duo shook his head, stray hairs tickling Heero’s nose. One hand slid up Heero’s back, tracing a long curving line around the knobs of his spine. The other stayed wrapped around Heero’s hard center, thrusting gently from base to tip, a slow rhythm Duo knew had to be driving the other man mad. ‘I’ll do you a trade, okay?

‘What?’ Heero bit his teeth together.

‘You let me make you come by stroking your gorgeous cock and you don’t give me English lessons while we make love, okay?’ Duo pulled Heero’s face down to his, brushing his lips over Heero’s while his hand tightened and pulled around Heero’s length.

Heero cried out something incomprehensible that Duo was fairly certain wasn’t in English and pushed forward, thrusting into Duo’s hand as hard as he could several times. Then, with an amount of control Duo found unbelievable, he stopped, stayed still, actually managed to speak. ‘Maxwell...Duo...you...’

Duo shook his head, trying to pull Heero’s mouth back to his. ‘No, don’t worry...oh, God!’ The words were lost in light as Heero’s fingers wrapped around him and pulled, squeezed, copied and perfected everything he was doing to Heero. ‘God, lover, please...’ And then language was gone -- all he could do was pull Heero’s head down and try to swallow his lower lip.

Heero felt the world spin around him -- everything was dissolving...Duo was the only thing left. That Duo should keep touching him, that he should keep touching Duo, that the ball of heat and light in his stomach should grow brighter and hotter until -- ‘Christ! Duo!’

The slump of Heero’s body against his and the sudden burst of wetness over his own aching hardness was enough for Duo. He groaned into Heero’s mouth and felt a last gentle stroke send him up into a long, unending, neverending convulsion against the hard plane of Heero’s stomach.

* * *

WuFei lay awake in the next room, hands linked behind his head, a single sheet covering him from the waist down, listening to the noise behind the walls. It wasn’t Quatre’s fault this house had such thin walls and that sound carried so readily between rooms. He had bought it because there was enough space for the five Gundams to be stored and repaired, not because it had good acoustics.

WuFei had no trouble identifying the noises. A year spent in various safehouses with Quatre and Trowa was more than enough sexual education for any one man.

He stared up at the dark ceiling. _So. Maxwell and Yuy finally figured it out._

He sat up, flicked on the light, pulled his robe around him and crossed the room to his desk. Turning on a light there, he opened a drawer and pulled out paper, a brush, a small bottle of black ink. He arranged them before him, the square of thick, rough-textured paper directly in front of him between his relaxed hands, the opened inkbottle and brush slightly to one side. _See the facts before you._

He closed his eyes for a second, cementing the image in his mind, then, flicking his loose black hair out of his eyes, bent over the paper.

The room was silent once the noises behind the wall had ceased. The brush on the soft paper made almost no sound and WuFei himself was silent. The wind brushed past the shutters once or twice and there was a sound as of a distant hunting owl. WuFei did not move, concentrating entirely on his task, biting his lower lip slightly as he focussed on the painting forming under his hands.

A digital clock on the bedside table silently counted up minutes, a half hour, an hour, another half...

WuFei finally sat back, setting the brush on its porcelain rest. He regarded his work for a long moment, reaching out as if he could caress it with one fingertip, but stopping just short of the still wet brushstrokes. He sat like that for a second or two, then clenched his hand into a tight fist and pushed the painting into the center of the desk where it could dry evenly under the light. _Understand. Those are facts._

He opened his desk drawer again and pulled out the slat that apparently formed the bottom, but was, in fact, false. Below the false bottom was a bundle of papers. He pulled this out and replaced the false slat. He sat for a moment with the papers in his hands, looking down at them meditatively. They were covered with even black writing, some in characters, some in English.

WuFei reached out to pick up the painting, too, but his hand hesitated and he looked at it for a moment, then let it lie. _No. Keep that. Let it remind me._

He stood up and went out into the corridor.

* * *

Down in the common room, the wood stove was still burning. Trowa had, as always, built up a good fire that would still be smoldering warm when they all came down to breakfast in the morning.

WuFei knelt on the tiny patch of brick hearth and used the poker to pull open the stove door. Heat hit him in the face but he did not move back. He looked again at the bundle of papers in his hands then, with one swift movement, he shoved them through the open door and closed it.

He sat back on his heels, hands on his thighs. _Understand. See the facts._

He sat like that for a long time.

* * *

Upstairs on WuFei’s desk, a painting dried slowly, the ink crinkling the paper a little as it dried. On the paper a brushed ink sketch of two young men in each other’s arms. One had a long braid wound around his shoulders; the other, a mop of dark hair over his eyes. The braided man was curled into his lover’s arms, cheek pressed to his chest. The shorthaired man was leaning back against the wide headboard of an oldfashioned wooden bed, his arms wrapped around his smaller partner.

**Author's Note:**

> So this was actually the first piece of slash I ever wrote. Cue 'awwwws' all 'round, please. :) It was originally meant to be part of a larger series of stories that myself and two other friends were going to write; as it turned out, this was the only one that ever really saw the light of day! I've got a couple shorter pieces that follow this one; they might go up at some point in the future.
> 
> Brief (fangirl) Japanese glossary:  
> baka: idiot  
> yamatte: stop  
> gomen/gomen nasai: sorry  
> kisama: bastard


End file.
